


How lucky I am to have you

by HopeSilverheart



Series: Loving Em at 2AM [58]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: (aka I insert my friends and I in a fic again), (sort of at least), Alternate Universe - Human, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Girls are the best, Girls' Night, Hurt Isabelle Lightwood, Hurt/Comfort, Insecure Isabelle Lightwood, Internal Monologue, Introspection, Mental Health Issues, Supportive Clary Fray, Supportive Lydia Branwell, Supportive Maia Roberts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-09
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:26:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25155439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HopeSilverheart/pseuds/HopeSilverheart
Summary: She finds a small amount of comfort in the knowledge that these three girls are in the same city as her, and care about her – to some extent, at least. They haven’t known each other long, she knows, not long enough for her to tell them she’s afraid of losing them, but she thinks about it for a long while until there are tears threatening to fall again.She curses herself and her emotional brain and goes right back to the conversation, only to freeze at the sight of one of the messages Clary sent a few nights earlier. It’s nothing big, nothing that should make her feel like the ground has been pulled out from under her, but it’s also… It’s so much."I can’t believe how lucky I am to have people like you in my life."
Relationships: Isabelle Lightwood & Clary Fray & Maia Roberts & Lydia Branwell
Series: Loving Em at 2AM [58]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1764400
Comments: 1
Kudos: 7





	How lucky I am to have you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thatnerdemryn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatnerdemryn/gifts), [lawsofchaos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lawsofchaos/gifts), [Skylar102](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skylar102/gifts).



Izzy stares at her ceiling, trying to catch a breath through her tears and helplessly attempting to calm herself down. She knows it won’t last forever, knows it’ll go away soon enough, but she wants it to be done _now_.

She doesn’t know what to call it exactly, doesn’t know if there’s a word that could accurately describe the feeling of hollowness she feels in her chest every once in a while, taking over her mind and making her feel completely hopeless. She knows, rationally, that she isn’t the only person who goes through this, but it sometimes feels so personal that it sends her even deeper into a spiral, wondering if there’s something wrong with her.

Sometimes, it builds up over the course of the day. She’ll wake up with a weight on her chest, find herself almost incapable of smiling, and has to wade through hours and hours of social interactions whilst pretending she isn’t breaking down on the inside. Sometimes, it fills her slowly and only comes out when she’s alone at night, in the safety of her bed, ready to finally let the tears slip out and the sobs heave out of her chest.

But sometimes… Sometimes it comes out of nowhere, hitting her straight in the chest and making her breathless for a few seconds before the world starts turning again. Those are the worst moments, the ones when she can’t control anything and doesn’t even know _why_ she’s suffering so much.

It might be the loneliness she feels, the emptiness in her chest despite the dozens of people she knows care about her, but it might be something else. It could be the pressure of being better, of doing right by the people she loves and of constantly exceeding their expectations. It could also be the feeling that no matter what she does, no matter how hard she tries, she’ll never be good enough.

When she’s fully aware and not drowning in tears, it’s easy enough to tell herself that it’s all in her mind. But when her mind turns into the only world that she knows, when her thoughts push and push her until she can’t think, until she can’t move, until she can’t _breathe_ , all she has are the darkest feelings that she tries so hard to bury in her heart.

And as she stares at the ceiling, she’s hit with the horrifying thought that it’s happening again. She can barely remember what she was doing before the feeling hit her and the first sob tore out of her throat. She had been singing, she thinks, or playing the guitar. There had been a headache building up behind her eyes, but it hadn’t bothered her too much so she had ignored it, hoping it would go away.

Then suddenly, she was going through the entire process again. First the tears, then the lack of oxygen, the quickening heartbeat, the pain, the _exhaustion_. It’s not a panic attack, she doesn’t think, but it still hurts like hell and makes her feel like she has no say over her own body.

(Let alone her own mind.)

But this time, something is different. It’s different, because even through the haze of pain and the blur of tears, there are voices at the back of her mind. Not the intrusive ones, the ones that tell her she’s worthless or failing or finally going insane. No, this time, she hears three distinctive voices, the ones that have been helping her sleep better and making her feel more loved than she has in a long time.

It’s different because, for once, her fingers itch to send a message and tell her friends she isn’t okay, she’s drowning, she needs to hear them or see them or just be with them. She’s never had that urge before, not even with her closest friends, but something about Maia, Lydia, and Clary makes her want to pour her heart out into words and let them comfort her.

Usually, she doesn’t want the comfort. And even now, even as she yearns for her friends’ reassurances, she still isn’t sure she wants them. She isn’t sure she wants to hear them tell her everything is okay, because how on earth can they know that? But still, her fingers are itching to act, so she lets her fingernails dig into her skin instead, not enough to truly hurt herself, but just enough to make her feel a little more alive.

She regrets it instantly, Clary’s words echoing clearly in her mind, a soft ‘ _you should stop that, Isabelle_ ’ that had come out when Isabelle had been having a bad day. Most of the time, she manages to stick to her promise and keep her hands doing something else, something a little less harmful. Even now, Clary is the one who makes her stop, even if she doesn’t know it.

She tears her hands away from her arms and clenches them into her sheets, biting down on her bottom lip as yet another pained sob resounds in the silence. She’s never been happier to live alone.

(She’s never been sadder to live alone.)

She knows Alec would come over in less than a minute if she told him she was having a rough night, knows her brother would drop everything on a second’s notice and rush to her apartment. She knows it, but she’s not sure there’s a single thing he could say that would make her feel better.

Her fingers itch again, and her eyes stray to her phone. She doesn’t want to be a bother. She knows Maia is working another shift at work and is tired all the time, knows Lydia likes going to bed early, knows Clary has her own issues to work through and probably doesn’t need Isabelle’s added to her burden. She knows all this, which is why her hands haven’t moved yet.

But god is it tempting to reach out, turn on her phone, and see their groupchat glaring at her brightly. Maybe she can just look at their latest messages, since those never fail to make her smile. She won’t even have to send anything, since her friends are all too busy to see her lurking. It’s the perfect plan, a way for her to get the itch out of her fingers without having to go through with the one thing she doesn’t think she can do.

( _Yet_ , her mind whispers. _Not yet_.)

She spends fifteen minutes like that, laying on her side and scrolling through their conversation, a small smile curling at her lips when she finds something particularly funny. Her headache is getting worse, but she couldn’t care less, not when dealing with that problem involves getting up and actually _doing_ something. Right now, she doesn’t want to do anything. Except maybe sleep, but hell if that’s going to happen anytime soon.

Instead, she keeps on reading their debates and looking at their pictures, finding a small amount of comfort in the knowledge that these three girls are in the same city as her, and care about her – to some extent, at least. They haven’t known each other long, she knows, not long enough for her to tell them she’s afraid of losing them, but she thinks about it for a long while until there are tears threatening to fall again.

She curses herself and her emotional brain and goes right back to the conversation, only to freeze at the sight of one of the messages Clary sent a few nights earlier. It’s nothing big, nothing that should make her feel like the ground has been pulled out from under her, but it’s also… It’s so much.

_I can’t believe how lucky I am to have people like you in my life_.

It’s nothing Izzy hasn’t thought herself, especially not in the past few weeks, after they met in person for the very first time and realised it was all very _real_. But coming from Clary, kind and wonderful Clary, it’s almost too much. A tear rolls down Isabelle’s face, staining it even further, and then another, another, and then she’s sobbing again, tucking her legs closer to her body and trying to ignore the way she’s shaking.

She doesn’t understand herself, doesn’t understand this itch she’s never had before, and she doesn’t understand… She doesn’t understand why she feels like her friends wouldn’t mind if she sent the message. After all, even some of her closest friends have dismissed her worries before, sending her platitudes that meant nothing at all. But the other girls have their bad days too, and although they don’t always talk about them in detail, they let her know. They type it out, they make it _real_.

Maybe that’s been the problem all along. Because even though she knows her tears and sobs and fears are sincere, there’s a part of her that believes that, as long as she doesn’t acknowledge them, they’re her little secret. Something she keeps to herself and the walls of her bedroom. Only Alec knows these little… breakdowns are regular, and he knows she doesn’t want to talk about them with him, the same way he doesn’t want to talk to her about his issues sometimes.

Point is, her tears are only real if someone knows about them. They only matter if someone knows they cause her pain, if someone is aware she’s been trying to cry herself to sleep for the past hour. So why, oh _why_ , are her fingers still itching?

Her mind knows this is a bad idea, that talking about her problems will only make her friends… Well, she’s not sure what they’d do if they knew, but it can’t be good. Nothing good ever comes out of her body’s temper tantrums, and this is no different. Her body, however, the one responsible for all of _this_ , the one causing her the pain in the first place, seems to think differently.

Izzy grits her teeth as she fiddles with her sheets, her fingers clenching and unclenching around the fabric repeatedly. She’s always been the type of person who needs to fidget, but it’s never been quite so bad. She can usually ignore it, or just dig her fingernails into the palm of her hands until they leave tiny crescents she can stare at entrancingly, but neither of those are options right now. The first, because her fingers itch too much for her to forget about them, and the second because she made a promise, and she’s trying to keep it.

She’s really trying to keep it.

Her hands reach back for her phone, and her fingers are working before Izzy can stop them, all of them slightly wet with tears but typing her message out as though it’s been on the tip of her mind all along. As though it was only a matter of time before her body won over her brain.

_I: I think something’s wrong with me. I can’t stop crying, and nothing’s wrong but it feels like the world is closing in around me and I can’t breathe and I know you’re all busy but I feel so_ lonely _and I don’t know how to make it stop._

_I: I don’t know why I’m sending this._

_I: Never mind._

She sends the last two a millisecond after the first one, hoping it’ll prevent her friends from reading her pathetic paragraph. She could delete it, she knows, but for some reason she just… she can’t. Her fingers aren’t itching anymore, and her mind has quietened just a little bit, and she somehow knows taking those words back wouldn’t help.

Maybe she wants her friends’ comfort after all.

_C: I’m on my way_ , _love_.

_M: Give me ten minutes._

_L: I’ll be there as soon as I can be, ladybug._

She doesn’t know why, but their words are enough to have her breathing easier. The tears are still streaming down her face rapidly, and she still looks like a mess, and her thoughts haven’t calmed down much, but at least there are no more sobs wracking her body and taking away her basic skills.

She thinks about moving, about making herself presentable for her friends, but something tells her they would see right through it. It’s not like her message was particularly reassuring, so they’ll probably expect to see her balling her eyes out, cheeks splotchy and hair dishevelled. They wouldn’t be wrong, either. Besides, Clary has a set of keys to her apartment, so it’s not like they can’t let themselves in.

She’s too tired to get up. Physically tired, mentally exhausted, and just not ready to even think about moving anytime soon. Moving can wait a while longer, at least until her friends force her to do something other than lay on her bed crying. At least until she feels a little less like she’s dying from the inside out.

By the time Clary’s light footsteps echo in the empty corridor and her door clicks open, Izzy isn’t even sure she’s crying anymore. She just feels numb, like someone carved all the feelings out of her body and sent them somewhere else. It should feel better, to not have to deal with the sadness and loneliness and pain, but feeling nothing at all is overrated.

(Although frankly, feeling too much is _also_ overrated. There’s probably a healthy medium, but Izzy can’t remember what it feels like.)

“Isabelle?”

Alright, so maybe the tears aren’t completely gone, but it’s all Clary’s fault. Clary with her sweet voice and her concerned tone and the now-familiar smell of her perfume overshadowed by the smell of Izzy’s favourite tea order. And then Isabelle notices the redhead isn’t alone, and she lets out an embarrassing sob at the sight of Maia and Lydia, standing behind Clary with worry written all over their faces even as they do their best to smile reassuringly at her.

“Izzy,” Maia repeats softly, stepping closer to her and sitting on the edge of her rickety bed, raising a hand uncertainly. “Oh, _Iz_ , come here.”

The brunette doesn’t need to be told twice. She’s twisting around and sitting up even before Maia is done speaking, throwing herself into her friend’s arms without even thinking about it. Maia immediately cards her fingers through Izzy’s hair, making soothing sounds at the time and not even flinching when her shirt grows wet from Isabelle’s tears.

Soon enough, two bodies have joined them on the bed, their arms wrapped around Isabelle like she’s something precious, to be protected. They’ve hugged her before, but this feels different, somehow. It feels like they’re all vulnerable, even though Isabelle is the only one sobbing her heart out and barely breathing from the amount of pain and love she’s feeling at the moment.

Clary is whispering sweet nothings into her ear, and Lydia’s hands are tracing unrecognisable patterns against Isabelle’s back in a way that relaxes her just as much as Clary’s words and Maia’s gentle fingers do. They hold her and hold her and don’t say anything, don’t demand an explanation, and it’s almost enough to send Isabelle into another fit of tears and broken sobs.

_Almost._

Instead, she dives deep into her soul and realises the feeling of loneliness she was experiencing earlier is mostly gone. All that emptiness she was drowning in has been replaced by careful pieces of her friends’ kindness and love, and she doesn’t know whether it’s the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen, or simply an illusion that could shatter at any given time.

(Maybe it’s a bit of both, she thinks, and maybe that’s more than alright, as long as they can keep her up for a while longer.)

She doesn’t know how or when, but she eventually stops crying, her sobs turning into hiccups and her tears turning into wet streaks down her cheeks. She starts breathing normally again, too, basking in her friends’ familiar scents and wondering if it’s possible for her to stay there forever, locked in their embrace and protected by their strength. They’re the best shield against the world she could have asked for, and she hopes they know how much they’ve given her.

Then again, she could always just tell them, although her throat feels soar from all the crying and she’s pretty sure her voice would break if she tried to speak.

As though she’s reading her mind, Maia pulls away from her, cocks her head to the side, and nods at Lydia, who hurries back into the kitchen and comes back with the cup of tea cradled in her arms and a bright smile on her face.

“We weren’t sure if you would feel up to food, so we got you that awful tea from the place down the street instead,” Clary explains, wrinkling her nose at the smell coming from the concoction. Isabelle breathes it in deeply, a small sparkle of happiness entering her eyes, and she blushes as all her friends stare at her relievedly. “Seems like that was the right call.”

Izzy makes grabby hands at the drink until Lydia huffs and gives in, handing it over, and then the brunette is gulping it down like it’s the only form of subsistence she’s had all day. Which, well, isn’t far from the mark, but is still a gross exaggeration. She had a bowl of cereal at 10 that morning. Or at least, she thinks she did.

“You’re surprisingly terrible at taking care of yourself for someone who goes to medical school, ladybug,” Lydia shakes her head.

“Not all the time,” Clary corrects, glancing at Isabelle fondly. “But when you’re having a bad day, you definitely tend to forget how to function properly. Not that I’m judging you; in fact, I can relate more than I care to think about.”

“I don’t-” Isabelle started, wincing when her voice comes out as more of a croak than anything else. “I’ve never had a bad day around you guys before, so how do you…? I mean-”

“Oh, love,” Clary says, a sad smile on her face. “We may not have known you your entire life, Isabelle, but we’ve gotten to learn a lot about you over the last few months, and we know you have plenty of bad days, no matter how hard you try to hide them behind smiles and jokes and all the things you do so well. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, though.”

“In fact, you should be proud of yourself,” Maia nods, chuckling when Isabelle only frowns confusedly. She cups Izzy’s cheek gently as she speaks again. “Bad days are… Well, they’re bad, of course, and sometimes it feels like pretending they never happened is the best solution. The fact that you told us you were struggling with your mind is the first step in the right direction, Iz. It’s a huge step, and you should be _so_ proud of yourself.”

“But I- I shouldn’t have even been feeling like this in the first place,” Izzy says slowly, looking away from Maia ashamedly and staring down at her tea instead. “Nothing bad happened today. My day was _fine_ , and then my mind just decided to make me feel like something was wrong, but everything is good, I promise. I had a bit of a headache earlier, and I still do now, but that was the only thing that went wrong.”

“So?” Lydia shrugs, laying down on the bed until her face is practically in Isabelle’s lap. “Just because you had a good day doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to have a bad night. Minds are mysterious things, as you very well know, and we’d be idiots to think we can control them. There doesn’t have to be a logical explanation behind your feelings, because sometimes, that’s all they are, _feelings_.”

“I just want them to stop,” Isabelle finally admits, biting down on her bottom lip and staring at her friends pleadingly. “I don’t want to feel like this anymore, I just want to sleep and be okay and not feel like I’m drowning in nothingness.”

“We know,” Clary whispers, drawing Isabelle closer to her until the brunette’s face is buried in the crook of her neck. “We know, love, but we’re here now. The pain might not go away quite yet, but we’re here for you and we’re not going to leave unless you want us to. We’ve got you, Isabelle.”

For a second, she thinks she’s going to start crying again, but maybe she’s used up her quota of tears for the night. Her smile comes out wobbly, but it’s there nevertheless, and it earns her three matching beams. Her friends scoot closer to her again, tangling them all into a heap of limbs on her bed and almost spilling her tea in the process, and Isabelle laughs weakly.

Her heart soars at the feeling of the three bodies curled around her, and although her soul still aches and the tears still feel like they’re two seconds away from overflowing, she feels just a little bit better. Not much, but enough that she knows things will be better in the morning, when she wakes up surrounded by three of her favourite people in the world.

The message had been impossible to send, and she had hated every second of it, but nothing could beat the overwhelming joy that had overcome her when her friends had entered her apartment.

She knows she’s far from being okay, but just as Maia said, she took a step in the right direction tonight, and that’s already better than anything she’s done in the past. And she has a feeling that, with these three women at her side, she’ll take plenty of steps in the right direction and eventually reach her goal – happiness, love, or something she hasn’t experienced just yet; whatever it is, she’s looking forward to finding out.

And until then, she’ll be content to lay next to her friends and let their voices lull her to the sleep she had been craving for hours. As she slips into the land of dreams, one last thought pops into her mind, a reflection of Clary’s written words.

_I can’t believe how lucky I am to have people like you in my life_.

**Author's Note:**

> Heya guys! Thank you so much for reading! Hope you all enjoyed this fic <3
> 
> Love, Junie. 
> 
> (find me on tumblr @hopesilverheart)


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